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Wii Hacked for Better Homebrew Games
arbourp writes to mention that hackers Michael Steil and Felix Domke have demonstrated a way to hack the Wii that makes running homebrew code much easier. "The hack advances the possibility of running homebrew code with access to full system resources on the device, not just programs that Nintendo has sanctioned. Such games might be developed to run from a DVD drive, at least in theory. No such games are available as yet and Nintendo may respond by attempting to revoke compromised encryption keys. However history shows such countermeasures are likely to ultimately prove futile."
Just to point out they use Star wars as an entry point, however on its own the game is wicked and you can use your wii-mote as god intended :)
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Wii Hacked for Better Homebrew Games
And the majority of these homebrew games look like retail games, except they're free.
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I love the way they did, it shows good ingenuity. If you watch the video, they explain that they can get into GameCube compatibility mode (what is used for GC style home brew) but that the ATI chip acts as a gateway to the extended RAM and other new neat stuff (SD card slot, BlueTooth, etc.).
By physically tying address lines on the memory chips, they could circumvent the address lock and read areas of memory they shouldn't be able to. Through this, they dumped the RAM though the controller ports (using them as serial ports) and were able to pick through it and start decoding it to find things like the signature that let them break out.
Very neat. I love reading about this kind of stuff.
It will be very interesting to see what people do with this. I never really heard about any interesting XBox homebrew, just running Linux and XBMC type stuff. Ditto with the 'cube. But the Wii should prove interesting.
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The most useful thing that could be done with this is to allow emulation of discs from a USB harddrive. That way I could put my originals away for protection. Yeah, that's it.
Shh.
Maybe not bad news for Nintendo.
Game consoles have never interested me, but I'd get one if it was hackable enough to run my own programs with full access to all the interesting bits of the hardware.
I suppose once I owned a game console, then I'd probably end up with a game or two. So maybe not bad news for Nintendo.
I don't really think it's that bad for Nintendo. Since they actually make money from the console, and this would just add an extra selling point, it would just mean more profit for Nintendo.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
That post really needed some more to be organized into coherent paragraphs, but I'll answer anyway...
is it because of the "scene" or is it because you "can"?
Yes, it's because they can. They enjoy the challenge.
When you have broken the system security to release your own homebrew - then what? Challenge over?
Yep, and then you move on to a new challenge. In reality, though, breaking the system security is just one of the first steps to making homebrew software; there are still many challenges left.
Now realize this my friend - why not create your OWN hardware with your OWN challenges?
Because that's a different kind of challenge, and not as fun to some people. Why don't you forge your own plate armor? Or learn a new language? Or study Tai Chi? Those are all challenges, but they're different and appeal to different types of people. Some people -- the people who are working on this kind of project, in fact -- think that breaking a system's security and making homebrew software is much more fun than making their own hardware.
Point is - whatever you end up doing - make sure you use that time you got - wisely - otherwise you're technically just wasting your time doing it!
If you spent your time having fun, is it really wasted?
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The hack was NOT presented by Steil and Domke. It was only presented at the end of their talk about xbox360 security at the CCC Congress. But the actual hack was presented by another person which name i don't know.
Many times I've been thinking - why is it so important to break the latest console to work with your "insert-homebrew-here"? Is it because it's some hardware that most have been importing in to your homes? is it because of the "scene" or is it because you "can"?.
I don't know. Did Edmund Hillary climb Everest because he thought there was prime real estate up there?
Wha? The Wii controller is a standard Bluetooth device. This page is just one of many that provides links to drivers, and details on how to install them, for using the Wiimote on either Windows or Linux.
No they told you exatly how they did it.
The keys are stored in protected memory. This memory is not accessable under normal conditions, as the gatekeeper chip disallows access to this. When the Wii is used in GC mode, this chip is disabled, but so is addressing to the upper regions of memory, so you still can't address it properly. BUT if you use a small peice of metal and join some of the address bus lines, in order to address higher addresses, these keys can be recovered.
Watch the video, very interesting.
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They can't revoke the encryption key because it's a hardware thing. And no, you still need a Drive chip like a Wiikey or a D2Ckey before you can run this, unless they end up doing something like Swap Magic. The Dreamcast was pretty much shipped with Debug mode on, which is why you could just burn a cd and it would run. If you chip your Wii, which you'll need to do anyway, you can just use the one for the GC. It's got every game for the SNES, NES, and a few other old systems. Gotta use the GC controller though.
One of the things that make consoles so attractive is that they are standardized hardware that so many people have in their homes. Development can be targeted for this specific hardware - to take advantages of its unique features.
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DRM and Copy Protection Schemes are cancer.